For The Man Who has Everything
by MissScorp
Summary: What do you give the man who has literally everything he could want? Just a bit of Christmas fluff. One-shot *Complete*


Christmas had come again to Gotham.

To prepare for the event, children hung stockings from mantles with the greatest of care, all with the hopes that a jolly fat man in a sleigh would make his deliveries there. Then they snuggled, warm and safe in their beds, and drifted to sleep with visions of their holiday booty dancing in their heads.

Mama's and Papa's quietly stowed away leftover tubes of colorful gift wrap, and hoped like anything they'd be able to get in a short little nap before their eager brood would bound down the stairs and demand to tear into the things Santa brought them.

Yes, on the outside, Gotham looked like any other city eagerly awaiting the arrival of Kris Kringle. It slumbered peacefully, its snow-covered streets glistening as twinkly lights bedecked balustrades and eaves. However, this city was unlike a great many of those other ones.

Chicago, New York City, Los Angeles all paled in comparison to Gotham. Here, looks were deceiving. What appeared a quiet northeastern city was one almost completely consumed by crime and corruption.

As Santa flew overhead, his sleigh packed high with presents for all the good girls and boys, an innumerable amount of shady deals and clandestine meetings occurred in Gotham's seedy underbelly.

Even on Christmas, at least a half-dozen breaking and unlawful entries happened, multiple assaults happened in dark corners, and other acts of violence got perpetrated behind the closed doors of homes from the Bristol District to the area known as the Narrows.

Nightclubs and bars had their doors open to their daring clientele. Munition deals happened down at the docks, drugs got sold to husbands and wives just looking to get through the holiday with some level of sanity, and trades of the flesh were enjoyed in cars parked beneath snow-laden overpasses.

This was Gotham.

Raya Kean had been drug into the city's sick and twisted underworld because the people supposed to serve and protect the denizens of this sleepy city had been the monsters who sought to hurt her and her uncle.

As she stood on the roof of the GCPD, the nine-year-old found herself thinking back a year ago. The only good to come from that night was that _he _rescued her.

Like an avenging angel, his black cape swirling around him like a Matador's cape, Batman swooped in and spirited her away before harm could be done to her. _Oh yes_, she thought with a tiny sigh that left her breath steaming white in the night air, _Batman became my Knight in shining black armor that night_.

Her dark hero was why she was on this roof at such a late hour. There was something she wanted to give him before it was too late. _Only_…

Raya shifted to stare at the searchlight that stood a few feet away from her. There was no _official _way to contact Batman really. He tended to contact her uncle when he felt communication was either warranted or necessary.

It was Christmas, though, and their special anniversary at that, and she wanted to give him something that would help him in stopping the Riddler. To achieve her goal, she used the same way she used the year before to call him.

This time, instead of a crudely drawn bat on transparent paper, wrought iron, fashioned into the shape of a bat was fixed to that klieg spotlight. Determined and confident in what she was about to do, she reached over and turned it on.

The image projected against the smooth velvet filled her with a giddy sort of elation, and a small trickle of pride. She couldn't take full credit for the creation of the bat-signal. She did have a lot of help from her new best friend and a certain butler.

Less than twenty minutes later there was a sound, much like the flapping of wings, from behind her. She turned and saw him standing by the searchlight, a larger than life figure who struck terror in the hearts of the bad people threatening to corrupt this city with their filth. She watched him trace that bat-shaped emblem with one gloved finger before he turned his cowled head towards her.

"Is this what you have been working on?" he asked in that low, throaty rasp that belonged to _Batman_. Yet the blue eyes he turned to her were filled with an amusement that belonged to _Bruce Wayne_. "You and your little Robin helper?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Well." Raya shifted back and forth on the balls of her feet, suddenly nervous despite having known him for a year now. "You said Uncle Jim needed a faster way to let Batman know there was trouble." She indicated the spotlight. "We thought this would work."

He knelt so he was eye level with her.

"I think it does, too," he said. "In fact, I think it's an appropriate way of reminding the city they are not alone." He did not smile, but there was a suspicious tremble to his lips. It wasn't caused by the cold. She knew his suit protected him from the city's frigid temperatures. "Not so long as men like your uncle and myself are here to protect them."

"Speaking of Uncle Jim…"

"Who has kidnapped your uncle this year, imp?" There was a humor, just a slight speckle of it in his tone. "Poison Ivy? Two-Face? Penguin?"

"Nobody has kidnapped him," she assured him with a smile. "He's waiting in his office for me, actually."

"He didn't follow you up here?"

"No." She shook her head. "He didn't."

"Why not?"

"'Cause I wanted to give you a present before he and I leave to spend Christmas with Auntie Barb, Barbara and James Jr."

She wasn't happy about the fact that she wouldn't be getting to spend Christmas with Bruce, Alfred, and Dick. She had begged both Bruce and her uncle to let her stay at Wayne Manor, but they had been firm that she needed to split the holiday between them. She would get to spend the majority of her Christmas break at Wayne Manor, so it wasn't like she wouldn't have any time with them.

"A present?" Batman made a soft sound deep in his throat. "You wanted to give _me_ a present before you leave?"

"Uh-huh."

"Why?"

"'Cause it's Christmas."

"We agreed that gift giving would wait until you came home from your aunt's."

_Alfred is right_, she thought, heaving a tiny sigh. _He might be the World's Greatest Detective, but he is also the most clueless man in the world at times_.

"This one cannot wait," she told him primly. "You need to open this one tonight."

"Why can't this one wait?"

"Because you will need it to stop the Riddler."

"I will?"

"Mhm." She nodded. "You will."

"Well." A small smile graced his lips. "Where is my present then?"

She reached over and picked up the small white box she tied with a scarlet red bow from where she set it before turning on the spotlight. She held it out to him without saying another word. She wasn't sure what to say or if she could even form the right words around the butterflies fluttering in the pit of her stomach.

"Thank you." To an outsider, what was inside the box wouldn't seem like anything important. However, to a man like Batman, it meant everything. He picked up the small flash-drive and studied it. "What is on this drive?"

"The new codes for accessing the GCPD mainframe," she told him in a hushed whisper. "Not even Commissioner Loeb has them."

"You stole these?"

"No." Her lips twitched. "Not exactly."

"Well, how _exactly_ did you get these?"

She blinked her eyes wide and said as innocently as she could, "The drive was just lying around."

"So, you decided to liberate it?"

"Well, Uncle Jim says we _propagated _it for the greater good."

"He's right." Batman tucked the drive into one of the pouches on his utility belt. "And so are you." He placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "I did need to open this gift tonight."

Warmth at his simple bit of praise shot through her, chasing away the bit of melancholy, and annoyance at not getting to spend Christmas with him still weighing her down. It wasn't often he doled out such words. That made them all the more precious to Raya who tucked them away in her mental vault.

"Merry Christmas, Batman."

He tucked a stray curl behind her ear.

"Merry Christmas, imp."

* * *

**A/N:** Hello, all, and welcome! I want to wish a Happy Holidays to all those who celebrate!

This is a small sequel to my larger work, **A Knight for Christmas**. I don't think it's overly imperative to read that story to understand this one (but I'd certainly love if you do!). Also, yes, I'm playing with the creation of the bat-signal, having it be something here designed by Dick, Alfred and Raya. This is a different universe I am writing in so I am changing things a little to make them unique to this created universe.

If you like this piece, please, favorite it! Comments are also deeply appreciated! Take care and have a happy holiday!


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